Water filtration has become common in homes, offices and other places to produce cleaner and better tasting water. Accordingly, water containers such as pitchers have been equipped with filtration systems. In some instances, these filtration systems may employ a filter core around which a piece of a filter medium is wrapped and secured. The filter core can include various openings that allow unfiltered water to enter the interior of the filter core by passing through the filter medium. The filtered water can then exit through an open end of the filter core.
Although filter assemblies such as that just described have proven useful in some circumstances, certain problems nonetheless remain. For example, the filter core is typically configured with an outlet of fixed diameter that is sized for a particular flow rate, or range of flow rates, based upon the filter medium, or filter media, employed in the associated filter assembly. This can be problematic from a variety of perspectives.
For example, a manufacturer would be required to produce an array of different filter cores, each having a particular outlet diameter matched to the particular filter medium, or media, expected to be used with that filter core. This is an inefficient approach to manufacturing inasmuch as it would require tool and/or process changes to manufacture filter cores having different outlet sizes.
A related concern is that careful attention must be paid during the manufacturing process to ensure that a filter core of the appropriate outlet diameter is correctly matched to the filter medium or filter media that is to be used with that filter core. For example, a filter core with relatively small outlet diameter, and a correspondingly low flow rate, may not provide a satisfactory consumer experience. As another example, a filter core with relatively large outlet diameter, and a correspondingly high flow rate, may not enable adequate contact time between the fluid and the filtration medium/media, thus limiting the effectiveness of the filter assembly.
Further, a filter core configuration with a fixed diameter can be problematic for the consumer as well. For example, even if the consumer is willing to exchange a degree of filtration effectiveness for a relatively higher flow rate, the fixed diameter of the filter core may prevent such a tradeoff, resulting in dissatisfaction on the part of the consumer. Likewise, even if the consumer is willing to accept a reduced flow rate in exchange for a relative improvement in filtration performance, the fixed diameter of the filter core may prevent such a tradeoff, again resulting in dissatisfaction on the part of the consumer.
In light of problems such as those noted above, it would be useful to provide a filter core that is not limited to a fixed flow rate, or range of flow rates. As well, it would useful to provide a filter core having a flow rate, or range of flow rates, that corresponds to the type of filter medium/media with which the filter core is employed. Finally, it would be useful to provide a filter core that can be readily configured to provide any one of a number of desired flow rates.